Let’s move on to more pleasant subject matters. “After birth abortion” seems a ripe choice to lighten the mood. A couple of pleasant, eugenics fiends (though they’ll never admit to being just that) named Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva inform us via the Journal of Medical Ethics (which words in that title are lies? I see two.) that ‘‘after-birth abortion’ (killing a newborn) should be permissible in all the cases where abortion is, including cases where the newborn is not disabled”.
Read the entire revolting article here.
Any reader here knows I’m pro-choice down to my bone marrow. Amoral “ethicists” like Giubilini and Minerva give anti-choicers great leeway and comfort with vile treatises like this one. It’s titled as if to give Rick Santorum and the like all the proof they need: “After-birth abortion: Why should the baby live?”. Giubilini and Minerva’s real point is pretty simple once the academic soot is sandblasted away. Some babies are inconvenient to parents so why not snap their necks in the crib so everyone can get on with the important aspects of living….such as shopping, taking in a ball game, and dining at any of a number of nice restaurants.
Dangerous, intelligent imbeciles like Giubilini and Minerva have no moral compass so take no responsibility for the obvious results of legalized infanticide. They hide behind academia (Oxford in this case) so they can play out their childish Let’s Play God fantasies, which have been dressed up with advanced degrees.
The results in the real world? Inconvenient children would be murdered willy nilly at increasingly later ages. When does a child really become a person anyway? 2 days? 2 years? Personally I don’t trust anyone’s thinking before they reach 25. There were a few in the last election cycle I wished at moments had been stripped of their personhood.
Let me invoke the obvious phrase: slippery slope.
Next stop: Let’s start killing old, infirm people, especially the homebound in neighborhoods ripe for gentrification. And then let’s kill people in mid-life who’ve had incapacitating accidents or are stricken with disease. What value to they have? Care taking can be very inconvenient, after all. One might miss work. Or a midday soap opera. You wanted a baby with blue eyes but got one with brown eyes? Kill him. Your child won’t sleep through the night? Kill her. Don’t like the grumpy old man on the bus? Make a case that he’s a drain on society and rather unpleasant to boot - then kill him. Once we’ve concluded an infant isn’t a person how hard can it be to strip the personhood of anyone we don’t like, anyone who causes us inconvenience. Hitler did it to an entire population. Jews went from cold-blooded elites, to subhuman deviants, to skin lampshades in about 12 years. One starts the process by stripping personhood.
If you can’t answer with ease “Why a baby should live?” then Santorum and the rest of the let’s patrol and control women’s bodies crew has won. Human beings have value. Period. Disabled infants have value. Anyone who’s ever been a caretaker for a person of any age knows this. Caring for our young, even the most taxing, has value…for all of us.
Imagine a society in which infanticide – the murder of the most vulnerable – was legal and accepted. Extrapolate that zeitgeist out to teenagers. To adults. Society has decided that infants have no value, therefore I might not have any – or the people I don’t like have no value. We’d have mass shootings not periodically, but daily. Hourly. None of this seems to have occurred to the utterly irresponsible Giubilini and Minerva.
Forcing women to carry a fetus to term is another matter, which is not for the state. When the fetus becomes a person is important to discuss and argue. In my view, women must be allowed control their bodies. But Giubilini and Minerva don’t care about this. They are inviting dehumanization of actual humans, already born, to justify killing them. Himmler must be smiling in hell.
Finally, I find Giubilini and Minerva, if not infants, than at least morally infantile and would like to suggest that it would be perfectly within their parent’s rights to…I mean are Giubilini and Minerva really persons? Let’s discuss this, write an academic paper or two on whether or not Giubilini and Minerva are, in fact, persons, then revisit the question. It seems to me they might just be taking up space, using resources, and causing inconvenience.
Bravo.
Sure women should ‘have control of their bodies’, that’s what birth control is for. and it’s very empowering. If a woman is of legal age and literate, pregnancy is a choice in most cases, not necessarily an obvious choice, but there are many factors involved. .Sure various methods can fail, but most do not, if used properly.Most late term abortions are due to medical issues related to the pregnancy.
There are so many people who want to adopt babies, the killing of a viable newborn is murder, imo.
Actually, I don’t understand why this is even in question.
I also still don’t understand why this is so often considered to be solely the woman’s responsibility. Child support goes on for a very long time, their sexual playmates should bear this in mind..
I know that I am out of sync in my views here, but this subject is so over blown and mostly unneccessary,with today’s medicine,and easy access to public health…
Where our society often fails, is with the ‘little girls’, some as young as ten or eleven. They hide the identity of the father, or try to Just as they try to hide, or don’t understand that they are pregnant.. An immediate abortion was strongly recommended for these girls, to avoid compromising their health and growth..There is no earthly way to describe the depravity of these situations.. .
Actually, ALL birth control methods fail at predictable rates, including the pill and sterilization. http://healthcenter.ucdavis.edu/topics/contraception/efficacy.html
Of 1000 women taking the pill for one year, with “perfect” use, .3% will become pregnant — that’s 3 out of 1000. The typical failure rate is 8% — 80 of 1000 women. There are millions of women on the pill, not for 1 year but for 20+ years, and NOBODY’s perfect.
What about the retarded, the mentally ill, addicts, the chronically unemployed and criminals?
Not only are they “useless mouths” but many of them have healthy organs that can be harvested to prolong the lives of the rest of us.
Public opinion is a brick wall on this subject. The Nazi program Aktion T4, particularly involving the extermination of handicapped children; was one of the few to be abandoned because of public protest–and we know how sensitive to popular sentiment they were. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_T4
Thank you John,.
Have you sent this to the “the utterly irresponsible Giubilini and Minerva”? Please send this response to the Journal of Medical Ethics. Are these two direct descendants of the leaders of the Third Reich?
From my perspective this is a non-issue-issue. I don’t know of any popular movement among women that supports infanticide. I do know this is an argument that has been used by anti-choice groups to circumvent abortion and reverse engineer the contraception argument. In fact the catholic church has reversed this argument of “when human life begins” to before conception, putting the egg and the sperm on equal footing with completely developed and viable fetus.
The argument today isn’t about infanticide, the argument today is that mostly male politicians, under the auspices of religious morality, are attempting in the U.S. Congress and State Govts around the nation, to decide for women whether or not we can control the production of eggs or the implantation of fertilized eggs that come from our ovaries, through denial of access to contraception in healthcare. If we should conceive and decide, for whatever reason, to terminate that pregnancy, we will be required by law to undergo state mandated procedures to make us look at the zygote in an effort to slut-shame us into making another decision. Notice, there is no such requirment for managing sperm to make sure it’s true purpose is fulfilled (because the boys wouldn’t tolerate anyone messing with their stuff) or requiring their sperm be used for nothing but fertilization, or no medical healthcare mandate insisting that if their stuff isn’t working properly, that they have no right to covered healthcare options to correct that condition. .
If the boyz-club can figure out how to deny women contraception in healthcare, many women will not be able to afford it. That is the bottom line. And if today they’re off-loading contraception, tomorrow has a full menu of services that certain religions or business owners who belong to certain eligions may decide conmpromise their religious conscience. Many things come to mind, but a couple are hysterectomy, blood transfusions, organ transplants, pain medications..
Advice to ladies of child bearing age. If your husband, man, lover supports this bullshit, you need to shut-er-down, until he changes his mind.
“From my perspective this is a non-issue-issue. ”
Mouse infanticide is definitely a non-issue issue for women. But, it is an issue for the anti-abortion/pro-life advocates, which is precisely why we have to discuss it and garner our best arguments against it. You know, don’t you, that the pro-life people are going to be all over this article and are going to be wringing their hands over it and arguing that this is where the abortionists are going?
NES: Yep, I know what they’re going to do, and ackowledged as much when I wrote ” I do know this is an argument that has been used by anti-choice groups to circumvent abortion and reverse engineer the contraception argument”.
This ethical argument in support of infanticide is not a new one and is a point of contention that the catholic church has used to it’s advantage for decades to push this “Life” notion backward, all the way down the conception & Life ladder to the egg and the sperm.
The church and much of christianity consider it infanticide, when a delivery decision is made by a doctor to forgo saving the baby to save the mother. You can’t argue or reason your way around that. Pro-choice activists have been arguing in favor of the mother/doctor decision in that circumstance for decades. Anti-choice activists have been arguing against the mother/doctor decision for decades.
Still, the fact remains there is no movement to legalize infanticide as it was described by Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva. The law in the U.S. varys by state, but infanticide isn’t on the menu.
I have 2 personal experiences in this regard. When I was about 10-12yrs old a close family friend and sister of an inlaw had a pregnancy that the doctor diagnosed as ectopic pregnancy. The Doc wanted to do a D&C, because there is no good outcome for the fetus with an ectopic pregnancy and if ignored can take the life of the mother. The priest advised against it because the procedure, even to this day, is considered by the RCC, abortion. The pregnancy went into 8-10 weeks, the fallopian ruputured, she died, and left 2 children.
Another close family friend had a pregnancy where some amniotic fluid issue had caused the baby to attach to the womb. I think you can imagine the consequence of vaginal delivery. The Doc realized the problem during labor and the couple decided to let nature take it’s course because the RCC said that to do otherwise was abortion. She died as did the baby (full term). It may have been a case where she could not have been saved, but her husband lamented that decision for the rest of his life.
Those are not infrequent stories. Today those sorts of issues can be diagnosed much sooner, but the solution is almost always what the RCC and much of the evangelical movement consider abortion. Nothing will ever change their mind. Less than 1% of abortions happen after 20 weeks, so it seems like the only thing that happens in the U.S. that would involve a viable fetus, would be mother’s life issue or some terrible catastrophy of nature concerning the fetus. Infanticide, to my mind, is a non-issue-issue, in principle and in practice.
And proof that no argument will ever change their mind, is that we litigated all of this nearly 50 years ago, with the same “infanticide” issues then as now, and they’re still at it.
And if it makes a difference these 2 guys, Australian if I remember correctly, have had their lives threatened. Oh, the sanctity of life.
We can disagree on this and still be friends, right?
“We can disagree on this and still be friends, right?”
Whoa! If that’s addressed to me, Mouse, I do hope it’s not a serious question! The answer is obvious — as in, of course! Moreover, I don’t see that we disagree on this at all. I’m totally on-board with abortion — in fact, if you apply my principles (which boil down to “Your rights end where my body begins.”), I’d have to support abortion all the way through the moment when a baby exits the woman’s body. I wouldn’t like to see that happen, of course — and I doubt it’d ever happen — but it’s a woman’s right to make that choice.
Anyway, perhaps your comment was directed at someone else — I don’t take anything in politics personally (except, the way Hillary was treated and cheated…and, god knows why I took that one personally, but it’s undeniable that I did).
“Whoa! If that’s addressed to me, Mouse,”
I was referring to my conclusion that this is a non-issue-issue (it’s such an old argument) and your conclusion that it is an issue. Or maybe I misunderstood you!
Hell, who knows, I’m so outrage fatigued with the religious right, it’s like we’ve been transported back to the 1950′s-1960′s and I hate it. Regardless, I’m preparing to indulge in a hiatus from commenting and take a long drive over to Coastal SC and then to FL where I’ll do the Hwy A1A drive and then on down to Miami, then the Keys. Not taking internet access, need some mind clearing, eating, drinking, beach walking, ocean viewing time, if ya know what i mean. 
Aha, Mouse. No, you didn’t misunderstand me: I do thnk it is an issue (which is why it has come up now, to fatigue and strain us all). So, yes, on that point we do disagree. But, hey, you did misread me if you think that kind of disagreement (or any, really) would put us at odds.
Have a splendid internet-free time — sounds wonderful. We’ll miss you in the debate JWS has fired up here. Join us when you’re back. (Zal will miss you too.)
“and criminals?
Not only are they “useless mouths” but many of them have healthy organs that can be harvested to prolong the lives of the rest of us.”
*********
Big business in China…When I was in Hong Kong a decade or so ago; there was a back up of ex-pat Chinese waiting for kidney transplants that were to be done on the mainland. There was a national holiday and executions were on “hold” for a week.
“If you can’t answer with ease “Why a baby should live?” then Santorum and the rest of the let’s patrol and control women’s bodies crew has won. Human beings have value. Period. Disabled infants have value. Anyone who’s ever been a caretaker for a person of any age knows this. Caring for our young, even the most taxing, has value…for all of us.”
Good piece, JWS. There should be no question that infanticide is wrong. But, I want to urge looking at it in a different way than the one suggested in the excerpt above. Rather than focus on the “value” of human life has or “personhood” — concepts which involve the judgment of others for validation — I would emphasize the individual’s right to his/her body and life. Viewed this way, no one has the right to kill another; period. This right is inalienable and is not subject to other persons’/society’s agreement that one has “value.” I locate my opposition to capital punishment in the same principle — the state may not have the right to kill a criminal, however heinous the crime; life imprisonment w/o parole should be the maximum punishment the state can impose. War is a complicating factor, but not really: in wars, states kill citizens of other states because they have the power to do so, but not the right. Power trumps over right in cases of war, but that’s why wars should be limited to just and absolutely necessary wars.
Staying away from a “personhood”-based analysis also makes it more difficult for the anti-abortionists to manipulate the issue for their agenda to reach deep into a woman’s ovaries.
“Staying away from a “personhood”-based analysis also makes it more difficult for the anti-abortionists to manipulate the issue for their agenda to reach deep into a woman’s ovaries.”
Agree!
I know you’ve all heard about or read about this, but I think it’s fundamental to how the contraception coverage in healthcare is being framed. Again, the right and it’s most prominent talking head is slut-shaming women for expecting contraception coverage in healthcare, BECAUSE IT IS A HEALTHCARE ISSUE FOR WOMEN.
RUSH LIMBAUGH, MAKING A TOTAL ASS OF HIMSELF AGAIN, but in the process revealing a lot about the religious group-think that has trapped the GOP in the dark ages.
Rush Limbaugh:
“What does it say about the college co-ed [Sandra] Fluke, who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says she must be paid to have sex?” Limbaugh asked. “What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She’s having so much sex she can’t afford the contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex.”
Limbaugh, married 4 times, no children (so, weak swimmers or birth control or no-sex), not to mention his other issues with drugs, doc shopping for drugs and illegal drug purchases, issues that would have landed a regular person in jail, thinks he has the moral platform to characterize a 24 year old woman, who believes contraception is and should be considered essential to women’s healthcare, a “slut” a “prostitute”?
And the next day he says:
This low-life needs to be off the air, permanently.
Yes, Rush needs to be off the air.
You have to excuse Rush. He needs to solicit sex tapes for those times in between his trips to the Domican Republic with that big bottle of Viagra.
Rush has been married 4 times. No children Might we assume that he either never had sex with his wives, or he participated in birth control and is a Slut, or he is shooting blanks?
“No children Might we assume that he either never had sex with his wives, or he participated in birth control and is a Slut, or he is shooting blanks?”
Maybe he has slow swimmers, or maybe he just can’t perform, that oxycontin will F’U up!
Polls, polls, polls: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/03/02/is_the_election_over_113333.html
There’s been a lot of further discussion of it on this blog (which the editor posts at)
http://blog.practicalethics.ox.ac.uk/
I appreciated this pro-life rebuttal from a Catholic Theologian because he does get my position as a pro-choicer:
http://blog.practicalethics.ox.ac.uk/2012/03/concern-for-our-vulnerable-prenatal-and-neonatal-children-a-brief-reply-to-giubilini-and-minerva/
Curses, l messed up the closing tag. The last paragraph is my own, not a quote.
Olympia Snowe gives it to both sides: http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/olympia-snowe-why-im-leaving-the-senate/2012/03/01/gIQApGYZlR_story.html
The word ‘abortion’, which has the purpose of terminating a PREGNANCY, is the tipoff to this ‘scholarly work”. Using the term “abortion” for this ludicrous assumption is just too convenient to suit me. Roe v Wade has been around since 1973, and did we ever read or hear from proponents this suggestion of killing babies after they are born to parents who intended to have a child but somehow doesn’t like its condition? Now, at this timely moment for the rabid right, we are reading all about it. Isn’t that convenient? Why, the Republicans should get right after this and make some more demeaning laws to put a stop to that which is not happening and was never suggested. Until…now–and call it “abortion”. Why, I’ll bet someone’s working on that legislation right this very moment to scare the crap out of Americans, seniors, the disabled, while rattling the cages of their favorite targets: Women.
The time is, as you say Uppity, too convenient — too convenient by half. It made me a little suspicious too, but I allowed my suspicions to be allayed by my kneejerk reaction that, surely, a couple of Oxonion scholars aren’t going to raise a false issue (as in, one they don’t believe in) for political gain (as in, to advance the pro-life agenda). That was a premature conclusion. So, maybe it’s worth finding out exactly who these two scholars are — their political affiliations and prior writings, for starters. (Chit, for all we know, they’re good Obots seeking to stir up the ‘social issues’ debate even more in order to advance O’s election prospects…that’s a joke, but not really…..)
But, regardless, I do think that this issue is one that needs to be addressed head-on and quashed with good, solid arguments. (Frankly, Roe v. Wade was based on very weak-tea reasoning, which is why it’s always been vulnerable to being rolled back.) This issue — and this framing of the debate is not going away: witness the number of “personhood” measures popping up in states, by way of a non-exhaustive example.
Corrigendum: “The timing is…”
I understand that you feel it should be answered, but at what point do we stop giving legitimacy to a bunch of Don Quixotes whose only purpose in life is to hobble women and get them back down on the farm by ANY means possible?
My first thought was that it was satire, my second was that it was fake. But the two authors appear to be actual disciples of Peter Singer so I think they are real doodoo heads.
“…but at what point do we stop giving legitimacy to a bunch of Don Quixotes….”
When we’ve reduced them to being (powerless, feckless, ineffective) Don Quixotes. Right now, they’re in the ascendant — it’s not the time to take the high ground and put down one’s weapons. The fact that Roe v. Wade is still the law is a thin reed for us to stand on — it’s been made thinner over the years. It’s focus on trimesters and viability is too flimsy and not principled, which means, ultimately, it is not reliably defensible. Consider this: once medical science makes it possible for a fertilized egg to gestate and grow in ‘an iron womb,’ Roe v. Wade will be a very thn reed indeed to stand on; let’s not wait till then.
I should’ve added: Currently, they’re in the ascendant and, therefore, not at all Don Quixotes, tilting at windmills.
Well like I keep saying, NES. This is nothing 50,000 women standing in front of the White House and Congress with torches and pitchforks can’t fix. This is up to the third wavers. It’s their future that’s in danger. If I ever got pregnant I know what I would name the child: SURPRISE! I am not the least bit affected by all of these silly attempts. But I care about the future of women. I stood in the rain and snow for what, again
The ball is in their court. They can either do their nails or break some nails. I already gave at the office and have the bruises to prove it. You don’t ‘reason’ with these crazy asses. You don’t “ask” for your rights. You TAKE them. That ludicrouse vaginal probe law would have been passed by now in VA if women didn’t show up in force. Women are on their own with this. They either pick up the gauntlet or they can just continue to play on facebook while they regress toward becoming 16th century chattel bit by bit. Seriously, one would almost have to move to the middle east to find crazy asses like these guys. To me, either this ‘article’ is a setup or I’m Cleopatra.
“Why, I’ll bet someone’s working on that legislation right this very moment to scare the crap out of Americans, seniors, the disabled, while rattling the cages of their favorite targets: Women”
That is my suspicion also. As I senior I’m more worried that someone will keep me alive than put me to sleep. I have given explicit instructions to my partner & children to set me free when I’m no longer me. I’ve had a good life, no regrets, except maybe for the time me and a friend drank a fifth of tequilla in a few hours. I shook for 3 days. Never did find my shoes. The rest of it is too disgusting to share.
.
So those were YOUR shoes, Mouse?
“So those were YOUR shoes, Mouse?”
LOL!!!!
“Well like I keep saying, NES. This is nothing 50,000 women standing in front of the White House and Congress with torches and pitchforks can’t fix.”
I’m all for that!
Maybe you’re right that we should stop arguing the point and just kick some ass instead. I could definitely sign up for that.
“I’ve had a good life, no regrets, except maybe for the time me and a friend drank a fifth of tequilla in a few hours.”
Hilarious!
I have a tequila-over-indulgence major-embarrassment story too. It was in college. I thank sweet jesus that my college years pre-dated cell phones, handheld device cameras, and Facebook. Phew…lucky escape!
A bunch of third wavers went to DC and stood in front of the Lincoln Memorial on behalf of Equal Pay. What they they do? Why they flash mob danced to music such as “9 to 5″–with big smiles on their faces. Look how well that worked out for them, hey? But, a good time was had by all. Especially the men who got to see their moves. And THIS is what is wrong here. You want to dance? Go dance! You want your rights? Go GET them.
“Maybe you’re right that we should stop arguing the point and just kick some ass instead. I could definitely sign up for that”
I think I can still get my leg up high enough to kick some ass. If not I can bitch at them to the point where they might just give up. I’ve used that technique successfully for about 6 decades.
votermom said that the Oxonions are disciples of Peter Singer. Here’s the Wiki on him:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Singer
“I think I can still get my leg up high enough to kick some ass.”
Bandita — Your leg will be plenty high enough if you’re mounted on your horse.
Oh yeah this worked,
JWS — Did you consider that this ‘scholarly’ article is a set up? If so, how did you rule out the possibility?
I don’t think John ruled anything in or out. I think he just put it forth for it’s own sake and sees the disregard for women and current law and its actual intent in its undertones.
I wouldn’t be surprised if this is a setup for the expected horrible worldwide deformities from Fukushima, which is many times worse than Chernobyl and still emitting radiation (enenews.com is a good aggregator). The people I follow are holding their breath, waiting for the earthquake big enough to topple the leaning Reactor 4, or for the missing cores in reactors 1 and 2 to hit groundwater. Boom! At fukushima-diary.com, I read unconfirmed reports that abortions in Japan are way up, and deformed babies are allowed to die; their parents are told they were born dead.
For examples of deformities following Chernobyl, watch “Chernobyl Heart” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ujAG_Ofj4M).
For old people, art rides to the rescue with the Euthanasia Coaster: http://www.julijonasurbonas.lt/p/euthanasia-coaster/.
That’s the best thing I’ve read in a while!
“Euthanasia Coaster” is a hypothetic euthanasia machine in the form of a roller coaster, engineered to humanely – with elegance and euphoria – take the life of a human being. Riding the coaster’s track, the rider is subjected to a series of intensive motion elements that induce various unique experiences: from euphoria to thrill, and from tunnel vision to loss of consciousness, and, eventually, death. Thanks to the marriage of the advanced cross-disciplinary research in space medicine, mechanical engineering, material technologies and, of course, gravity, the fatal journey is made pleasing, elegant and meaningful. Celebrating the limits of the human body but also the liberation from the horizontal life, this ‘kinetic sculpture’ is in fact the ultimate roller coaster: John Allen, former president of the famed Philadelphia Toboggan Company, once sad that “the ultimate roller coaster is built when you send out twenty-four people and they all come back dead. This could be done, you know.”
Indeed!
Here’re the interrelated fallacies at the center of the ‘scholarly’ article: “Merely being human is not in itself a reason for ascribing someone a right to life.” (See page 2of the article linked by JWS.). The authors then go on to analyze three types of “human life,” viz, stem cells; fetuses; and criminals on death row. (I kid you not.)
The first fallacy: A “right to life” is not “ascrib[ed]” to one by anyone else based on “a reason.”. It’s an inalienable right inherent in every individual; period. If one’s religious, it’s God-given; if, like me, one’s an atheist, it’s based in natural law or, if you prefer, humanism.
The second fallacy: Stems cells and fetuses are not individuals, and to equate them with a criminal individual on death row is, well, silly. Stem cells aren’t “human,” under any workable definition. A fetus is a form of human life, but it is parasitic (literally speaking) on its mother, and not an individual under any workable definition. The individual criminal condemned to die by the legal system hasn’t lost his/her right to life; rather, his/her right to life is trumped by the naked power of the state (and he/she dies with his/her ‘god-given,’ right to life intact, albeit fatally violated).
“A fetus is a form of human life, but it is parasitic (literally speaking) on its mother, and not an individual under any workable definition.”
*******
That’s where the term “viability” in the SCOTUS rulings creates problems, as viability of a fetus continues to become possible at an earlier and earlier gestational age.
I agree SHV. That is a weak link in the logic. It seems obvious that a fetus isn’t an individual, but it’s hard to articulate exactly why in non-viability terms. Any ideas?
And, yes, the viability test will, in short order, become a fatally weak link in the SCOTUS rulings. This is why I’ve always thought that Roe v. Wade’s reasoning is flawed. I believe it was the best the Court could do, politically (ie, to get a majority) at the time, but, nonetheless, it’s weak tea.
“That is a weak link in the logic. It seems obvious that a fetus isn’t an individual, but it’s hard to articulate exactly why in non-viability terms. Any ideas?”
***********
At the present time, with state of the art neonatal care, viability is only an issue in states where late second and third trimester terminations are permitted. It seems in these situations, the dividing line between “abortion” and infanticide is air in the lungs of the fetus. Seems to be the same legal “line”, for example, when a fetus/baby is found dead in a trash can. If there is air in the lungs then the mother can be charged with murder, otherwise it a case of ‘still-born” birth.
About ten years ago, I was involved in a situation where a doctor induced an abortion in a teen age girl, unfortunately for the doctor, the fetus was born breathing. IRRC, the doctor was prosecuted.
Was the doctor prosecuted in a Southern state?
I really do understand the argument against aborting third tri fetuses because of viability, but to start bleating that every time somebody has sex they are killing a baby if they use birth contro, or every time someone aborts a zygote or whatever, it’s murder — is just plain stupid and insane. Even more insane is this silliness that sex is only for procreation. Speak for yourselves, zealots. If you don’t like sex or think it’s only for rutting like animals do, or if you think your god is going to strike your ass dead for liking sex, that’s no reason for you to be vicariously peeking in everybody else’s bedroom. I swear these subjects ARE the sex life of some of these sexually repressed morons. Just goes to show you what sexual repression does to people. It makes them crazy. That’s why these goatf**kers in the middle east are so damned nasty. Every crazy thing they do has to do with sex.
“Was the doctor prosecuted in a Southern state?”
********
Yes, if, in fact he was prosecuted. I am reasonably sure that he lost his license. If prosecution occurred it was likely based on law to give medical care to a living child. The teenage girl and her mother went back to the doctors office when she began to have “labor” pains. The fetus/baby was born breathing; the doctor told the family to take it home an bury it. They instead went to the local ER, transport to a Children’s hospital, etc. I remember this case because I operated on the child and she went home about a month later.
Thanks for the background, SHV.
I’m curious about your reaction to JWS’s post and the embedded article by the Oxonions. It’s rare that one gets the opinion of doctor on abortion — I mean, you guys are so much closer to life-and-death issues than the average person. I wonder if that gives you a relatively unique perspective on the overheated debate.
“It’s rare that one gets the opinion of doctor on abortion”
NES, when abortion was illegal, we heard from doctors who had to deal with the consequences of illegal abortions. With legalized abortion, the maimings and fatalities pretty much stopped (abortion is the most common surgery in the U.S., and safer than proceeding through childbirth). Now those doctors are retired, or dead, and people don’t remember what it used it be like.
I did not consider that this was a “set up” in the sense that these 2 people did not mean what they said. It seems to me they do mean to discuss this as if it is a rational idea. Now if it is a “set up” in the sense that anti-choice types can use it to distort the choice issue – then sure that’s possible. But then the piece remains true. Smearing pro-choice people with infanticide has a long history already. Blunting the argument has a purpose. I see no reason to refute amorality like this from a pro-choice perspective. Pro choice or not – these 2 scholars need to be refuted forcefully.
I’m not a woman so don’t come to my belief about choice from the nuance that many women do. My take is libertarian. People, not the state, ought to control their bodies which includes people who are pregnant. Still, I’m very uncomfortable with abortion. There is a point in pregnancy when it must not be an option. In large measure we’ve agreed to that point. I wish there wasn’t any abortions. For that happen rape would need to end, responsible reality based conversation about human sexuality would have to be the norm and birth control would need to be available to all who are sexually active. Since none of those three things is likely to happen soon, allowing the person who is pregnant to decide what occurs with her body – up until fetal viability – is the most rational option.
Nothing in the above paragraph has anything to do with what the writers of the paper are discussing. They use the difficult issue of abortion to promote what I believe is a eugenics argument. At any point one can remove “unwanted child” and insert “Jew” or “child with the gay gene” or “downs syndrome” or anything really to justify the purging through murder of something perceived as undesirable.
I agree on the eugenics point, JWS. Their argument is one that a eugenecist would make. Also, that point seems to be borne out by the endnotes on their sources.
“Pro choice or not – these 2 scholars need to be refuted forcefully.”
Agreed. And, you have done it forcefully.
Spot on, John. The dynamic here is so interesting. So many well informed people come here to read, think, and post, yet look how quickly all the urgent issues of our country and the world are set aside, in order to grab everyone’s personal vision of the moral high ground on these very old, and intimate issues, . In a world coming down around our ears, where for so many, just staying alive is a daily challenge, are we not behaving exactly as the pols want ?? They are so skilled in the art of distraction, and they know it is human nature to want to focus on small, manageable problems, when reality is so overwhelming . We need to stop taking the bait from a media that is running out of ways to spin their ‘star’.
“… it is human nature to want to focus on small, manageable problems, …”
Sophie, what is “small manageable problems” a reference to? Abortion being equated with infantacide? If so, I wouldn’t say that’s a small problem. But, maybe you meant something else.
“We need to stop taking the bait from a media that is running out of ways to spin their ‘star’.”
Yes, Sophie, you’re CORRECT. Thanks for ringing us back to reality. (Although I have to admit, I love puzzling out these ethical/logical conundrums.
Here’s what I want to know — Does anyone know how and from what source this med. jnl. piece entered the mainstream press? Anyone? I’m really curious now.
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“I’m curious about your reaction to JWS’s post and the embedded article by the Oxonions. It’s rare that one gets the opinion of doctor on abortion — I mean, you guys are so much closer to life-and-death issues than the average person. I wonder if that gives you a relatively unique perspective on the overheated debate.”
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Maybe this could be your first post at UW. :>) “it” is an interesting ethical topic that can quickly turn to name calling. At a somewhat simplistic level, the extremes of the “debate” are 1) person-hood with all legal rights begins at conception 2) the mother has absolute rights of life/death of the fetus/baby up to and until the the first breath is taken; irrespective of gestational age.
Euthanasia, is, IMO a different topic.
Or someone could point out that “after-birth abortion” is oxymoronic and disingenuous.
Abortion is the termination of pregnancy. Once birth has occurred, pregnancy is over. The killing of a human being after birth is called murder. It’s kind of an important distinction.
Intelligent people publishing articles in medical and ethics journals ought to know the difference.